Redeeming Decades of Addiction

“I was introduced to cocaine, and I found that I could bring that drug to a town that didn't have any cocaine and pretty much met the need of the people I was smoking marijuana with," says Brian.

Brian was raised in the church and his parents were Christians. but he says it never felt personal. “We would hear, you know, about Jesus and I knew the stories in the Bible,’ he recalls. I just thought it was just religion and I didn't have any relationship at all with God.”

His father was a good provider, but worked long hours, and played music on the weekends, which caused Brian to feel rejected. “There was a lot of weekends that he would be away. I probably felt like he could have been around more often.”                 

Brian was a straight-laced student who got good grades, until he began spending time at a relative’s house.  “That’s where I was really introduced to alcohol and marijuana,” Brian adds.

Brian hoped to go to college, but was hungover when he took the entrance exam. with few other career options in his rural Indiana home, he turned to selling drugs. “I really didn't see the need for college, because there was so much money in selling the drug that I was using,” he says. “There was a lot of pride and a lot of greed, you know, there was a status, too, of having control of things. Yet I was out of control.”

As a result of his dealing, Brian had four felonies by the time he was in his mid-twenties: “I was arrested for methamphetamine. And when I was introduced to heroin, I fell in love with something that could fill every void inside of me. I would never tell myself that I had a problem. You know, I would blame other people.”

All the while Brian’s parents prayed for him. “We prayed for him every day,” Ed Blevins says. “We thought some early morning hour, we would get a call saying that he was in a wreck or overdosed.”

In 2015, Brian was attending thanksgiving dinner with his family when he got a big surprise. “I was arrested and I was put in jail,” Brian says. “I was so full of shame, guilt and condemnation, that I couldn't pick up the telephone and call my parents because I was so ashamed of who I had become.”

Brian’s father asked a family friend to visit him in prison. “He looked at me and he said, ‘Brian, ’If you died today,’ he said, ‘Where would you go?’ I was separated from God, you know. I didn't have a relationship. He really talked to me about a life with Jesus, and being able to repent, you know, for my sins,” Brian remembers. “And that He would take away my past. And that's when I gave my heart to Jesus.”

Brian went back to his jail cell.  “I said, ‘God, if you're real, it’s going to take a miracle to help rid me of what’s inside. And I said, ‘I'll go anywhere, I'll do anything, and I'll say anything, and I'll give you all the praise, honor and glory.”

Shortly after that, Brian went before a judge for sentencing. “He said, "Brian, I'm going to let you write your prescription to your recovery.’ And he gave me an opportunity to serve my six years on house arrest.”

Brian also got involved with AA and Celebrate Recovery. “I saw experience, strength, and hope from some other people, and they were talking about getting clean and staying clean,’ he says. “The selfish, prideful person became humble, and I no longer was a victim. I really wanted to fix all the relationships in my life.”

Today Brian and his parents are close again. he also runs “Hope House,” a program for recovering addicts, in Hartford City, Indiana. “I get to minister Christ and witness my story through my experience,” Brian says. “So I just try to meet the needs of the recovery community, and in doing that, it really helps me to maintain my sobriety.”

His father adds, “There was a time when I used to tell Brian, ‘Brian, why can't you be more like your dad and do the right thing?’ And now I wish I could be more like him.”

“God's grace in my life has just been so good and so amazing,” Brian says. “I just try to do my best to seek His face every day and, to share His grace with those I come in contact with.”